He said they sub­se­quently stopped and searched the car near the Police Train­ing Col­lege in Maseru and found two 9mm pis­tols and some rounds of am­mu­ni­tion.

“Five men were ar­rested and we are still search­ing for two more who were posted at the out­lets to keep a close eye on move­ments be­fore the ac­tual mis­sion would be ac­com­plished,” SSP Map­ola said.

SSP Map­ola also said they sus­pected the in­tended heist was planned pos­si­bly with the as­sis­tance of some em­ploy­ees of the fast food chain.

The five ap­peared be­fore the Mag­is­trate’s Court on Tuesday on charges of con­tra­ven­ing Sec­tion 3 (2) of the In­ter­nal Se­cu­rity Arms and Am­mu­ni­tion Act No. 17 of 1966 as amended. He said that two of the rob­bers were from Tem­bisa and Soweto in South African’s Gaut­eng prov­ince.

One of the un­li­censed firearms was a sil­ver C275 loaded with 15 rounds of am­mu­ni­tion and the other a Tan­fo­lio with 13 rounds of am­mu­ni­tion.

Bereng Mothobi (34) of Lekha­la­neng in Maseru and Sibu­siso Mkhize (27) of Ivory Park in Jo­han­nes­burg, South Africa were found guilty of the charges.

In mit­i­ga­tion, Mothobi asked for the court’s le­niency as he said he had three small chil­dren to take care of and one of his par­ents was a street ven­dor.

Mkhize also begged for for­give­ness, telling the court: “I have a small child. My child is in Jo­han­nes­burg alone while I am here. I was try­ing to sell this gun.”

They were each sen­tenced to pay a fine of M2000 or two years im­pris­on­ment in de­fault of pay­ment. Both failed to pay the amounts.

The case was heard by Mag­is­trate Mokhesi while Let­seka Lerotholi ap­peared for the prose­cu­tion.